Everfound (Skinjacker 3)

The other Afterlights had come to know him now as Monty, for the Three Card Monte game that he constantly played by himself, never letting anyone else choose the cards. Although many Afterlights knew his real name, they preferred Monty to Milos because Monty didn’t bother anyone.

That’s why, when Mary called for Milos, he didn’t respond right away. It took someone tapping him on his shoulder to make him look up from his cards and accompany his escort to where Mary waited.

“Milos, there you are!” Mary said when he came to her. He smiled, remembering that, yes, that had been his name.

“I am at your service, Miss Mary,” he said, then offered her something he never offered anyone. “I shall deal you the three cards and you can try to find the one-eyed jack, yes?”

“Not now, Milos,” she said gently. “But I do have something else I’d like you to do.” And then she leaned forward, and kissed him with such warmth and affection, it reminded him how much he loved her, how much he had done for her, and how much he still would do. It brought a trace of his failing memories back from the cloud that had enveloped his mind. Then she put her cheek against his, and whispered in his ear, “I need you to touch the scar wraith, Milos.”

Milos followed Mary’s gaze to the living man lying on the ground just a few feet away. Instantly Milos realized that this was the one-eyed jack he so feared, yet felt so drawn to.

“I need you to touch him, Milos . . . to wake up the new skinjackers who sleep.”

Tears began to well in his eyes and he looked to Mary and pleaded. “Will you do that thing that you do to the others? I’ve seen it. The way you touch their souls. Wrapping. Melding. Making them want whatever you want. Will you do that for me?”

But Mary shook her head. “I can’t do that to you, Milos,” she said. “The choice to sacrifice yourself for the greater good must be your choice alone.”

“But it’s what I want,” said Milos, his tears flowing more heavily now. “To be one with you, if only for a moment.”

Mary did not meet his gaze. “I will ask you, but I will not coerce you.”

Milos bit his lower lip and wiped his tears with the back of his hand, embarrassed for his display before all the others.

“Well, then,” he said, “why don’t we let the cards decide.” He went to the roll-top desk that Speedo had so proudly offered to Mary.

Shuffle, deal three, toss toss toss.

When he was done tossing the cards over one another, he steeled himself and chose the card to the right. He held it before him for a moment, seeing only the back, then he flipped it, and when he saw what it was, he laughed. It wasn’t the Jack of Hearts, or the missing Jack of Spades . . . it was the King of Hearts. The one with the sword through his head. The suicide king.

He turned to Mary. “Do you love me?” he asked.

Mary hesitated, and said, “I will remember you more fondly than almost anyone I’ve ever known.”

Milos sighed, realizing that fondness was as good as he was ever going to get.

With everyone watching, and Allie shaking her head, trying to speak behind her gag, Milos dropped his cards and they scattered. He would not need them anymore. He then knelt beside the one-eyed jack that had extinguished Squirrel. Milos knew he had done things in this world that were unforgivable. He knew that if he ever went into the light, he would face the most severe of consequences. He wasn’t sure what those consequences would be, but he feared them all the same. Yet all of those deeds had only been to make himself worthy in Mary’s eyes. Now he had to accept that nothing would ever make him worthy—not even this—but this would bring him closer than he had ever been before. He wondered if he could live with that. And then realized that he wouldn’t have to.

“I sacrifice my existence for you, Mary. I do this of my own free will.” Then he reached down, firmly clasped the hand of the unconscious scar wraith . . . and in a single, silent moment, Vitaly Milos Vayevsky ceased to exist.

Once again pangs of mourning rippled through the world, just as they had when Squirrel was extinguished. In every ocean, massive rogue waves rose from the sea, curling and crashing in places where no ship sailed, so no human eye could see. In the polar ice caps, every glacier calved tons of ice, losing face. And in the Jornado de Muerto desert, a hurricane formed, turning, against all logic, clockwise instead of counterclockwise, and remained fixed over the Trinity site, its clear, cloudless eye the exact size of the deadspot. The storm didn’t just rage in the living world, but in Everlost as well, where there were never such storms.

Again, a sudden, sharp pain wracked the gut of every Afterlight, and it was so severe this time that everyone doubled over, collapsing to the ground.

No one felt the pain more than Mary. It was worse than that knife wound that had re-killed her, worse than anything she had ever felt or ever imagined.

“What have I done?” she wailed. “What have I done? What have I done to myself?”

When the pain had passed, her vision cleared to see the storm raging just beyond the edge of the deadspot and her children surrounding her, terrified. Then, as she rose, regaining her bearings and her poise, she realized that both Allie and the scar wraith were gone.

Clarence had been jarred back to consciousness the moment of the extinguishing. The blow to his head had addled his brain, however. He wasn’t quite sure where, or when, or even who he was, and his head hurt something awful, like the worst of hangovers. When he turned, the first thing he saw lying on the ground beside him were objects that had fallen from the pile of shiny things just a few feet away. A trophy and a silver martini shaker. Having not known where they came from, he concluded this indeed must be a hangover, and the martini shaker was probably the cause of it. Between the trophy and the shaker was a single playing card: the Jack of Spades.

Beyond that were dozens of ghosties, all doubled over, moaning in pain. The doctors had said the ghosties weren’t real, and in his confused state, he thought that maybe they were right. He knew how to make them go away, though. All he had to do was cover his dead eye with his dead hand and he couldn’t see them anymore.

He stood up, feeling dizzy, as if he were in a fun house and the world was shifting beneath his feet. With his dead eye covered, all he saw was a massive plain of fused sand with clear skies above it, but the angry swirling maelstrom of a hurricane raging beyond the perimeter. A few yards to his right was a dead soldier with a gun in his hand, and far away, straight across the patch of fused sand, was a jeep.

Clarence didn’t know very much at that moment, but he did know this was not a place he wanted to be. So, with his dead eye covered and his good eye to lead the way, he staggered across the dark expanse of fused sand toward the jeep.

At that same moment, Allie was incapacitated by the pain, but she knew it gave her an advantage. While the others were doubled over, Allie stumbled over to the Afterlight who had handcuffed her, and thrust her hand into his pocket, retrieving the key. Ignoring the pain in her gut, she jammed the key into the small keyhole, turned it, and freed herself from the handcuffs, dropping them on the ground.